Listing other people’s quotations seems a lazy way to post on my blog. Part of me feels guilty about being so unoriginal. But the quotes I share below make me think and often lead me to continue my quest for education and for knowledge. They inspire me. They challenge preconceptions. Some are sad reflections. Some are vibrantly defiant. Some are ironically humorous. And many of them have led to the start of essays I hope to finish and share one day. There are dozens of quotes and thoughts about liberty and freedom that I admire. Below are but a few. Feel free to share some of your own favorite quotes on any topic in a comment.

“Force always attracts men of low morality.” ~ Albert Einstein

“Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.” ~ George Washington

“I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.” ~ Aldous Huxley

“Lord save us all from a hope tree that has lost the faculty of putting out blossoms.” ~Mark Twain

“There can be no real freedom without the freedom to fail.” ~ Eric Hoffer

“Can any of you seriously say the Bill of Rights could get through Congress today? It wouldn’t even get out of committee.” ~ F. Lee Bailey

“But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and gives it to the other persons to whom it doesn’t belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. Then abolish that law without delay … No legal plunder; this is the principle of justice, peace, order, stability, harmony and logic.” ~ Frederic Bastiat

“Then what is freedom? It is the will to be responsible to ourselves.” ~ Friedrich Neitzsche

“He knows nothing and thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.” ~ George Orwell

“[The average man] is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty — and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies.” ~ H.L. Mencken

“When A annoys or injures B on the pretense of saving or improving X, A is a scoundrel.” ~ H.L. Mencken

“The main thing that every political campaign in the United States demonstrates is that the politicians of all parties, despite their superficial enmities, are really members of one great brotherhood. Their principal, and indeed their sole, object is to collar public office, with all the privileges and profits that go therewith. They achieve this collaring by buying votes with other people’s money.” ~ H.L. Mencken

“Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule – and both commonly succeed, and are right.” ~ H.L. Mencken

“If you see a man approaching you with the obvious intent of doing you good, you should run for your life.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

“Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

“The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.” ~ Herbert Spencer